Datasheet

PART I

■

INSTALLATION, CONFIGURATION, AND CUSTOMIZATION

Figure 3.9. Switch to the Windows Classic style and you unlock Windows

color schemes that can charitably be described as “blinding.”

Themes, schemes, and skins

Microsoft uses the terms themes and schemes to mean different sub-

sets of technology, though to most end users the difference is acade-

mic. In the rest of the software world, anything that changes the look

and feel of an application is called a skin. Many programs are

“skinnable,” including MSN Messenger and Windows Media Player.

Although you’d think that skins apply to applications, and themes

apply to entire operating systems, it doesn’t always work that way —

WindowBlinds applies skins to Windows, according to the Web site.

Rather than get wound up about proper use of terminology, just pre-

tend that it all means the same thing: the changing of the interface to

look the way you want it to.

07_763209 ch03.qxp 12/22/05 10:27 PM Page 72